to staggering heights this week, and the full scale of the devastation became known, the generals of the ruling junta stayed put in the security of their artificial citadel of a capital, Naypyidaw. Not one senior government member ventured into the region that had suffered most, the low-lying Irrawaddy delta, where perhaps more than 100,000 people have died and one million homeless are living rough, without food or clean water.

Government media initially announced that 350 people had died in the cyclone, evidently hoping to repeat the deception concocted following the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, when an official death toll of just 13 was announced - although Thailand reported more than 2,000 victims of its own further down the Andaman coast.

When it became clear that it couldn't hide the true scale of the

current disaster, the regime casually announced a death toll of 22,500 - and then returned to more pressing matters, such as the return home of the PM (left of picture) from a visit to Thailand. His visit commanded more space than the cyclone crisis.

The wider repercussions of the crisis appear to be completely ignored by the regime.

The Irrawaddy delta is Burma's rice bowl, supplying most of the country's needs and some exports. The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that 65 per cent of Burma's rice production potential was destroyed as Cyclone Nargis ripped through the region's low-lying paddy fields. Fifty per cent of its poultry farms and 40 per cent of the pig rearing centres were destroyed - a nightmare scenario in a country that already has difficulty feeding its people.

The steep price rises that